D-Day (sort of)

Today is Donation Day for Mara. She just sent me an e-mail from the clinic next door saying it is going well and she is feeling good. Based on the pace of collection, she'll go back in tomorrow to finish providing the number of cells we want.

Out one arm, through the machine, in the other arm.

Mara: Stem cell donor, bag lady.

My own D-Day -- when Mara's forces storm onto the hopefully deserted beaches inside my marrow -- is undecided.

There are tradeoffs between proceeding immediately with the transplant and waiting. I am still recovering from several infections, and you want to go into transplant with as few infections as possible. My neutrophils are finally showing some signs of recovery, which increases my ability to take care of the infections I do have. The last four days of absolute neutrophil count have been 40, 40, 60, 100. They were showing glimmers more than a week ago, but then the infections shifted my body's energies. So, the longer we wait, the more vanquished my current infections will be. On the other hand, the longer we wait, the more opportunity there is for another infection to take advantage of my weakened immune system.

To try to move things along, I am going to start my own course of Neupogen -- the drug Mara took to boost stem cell production -- tonight. If I'm lucky, I'll experience the bone pain that means I have so many stem cells in my marrow that they are bursting.

Update: Mara stopped by. She's feeling tired, but otherwise OK after six hours tethered to the harvesting contraption. She is glad she didn't have to earn her Bedpan Badge.